Exod. xxxiv. 5 — 7. And the Lord descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord. And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty.
THE voice of inspiration says to every one of us, " Acquaint thyself with God, and be at peace." An
acquaintance with ourselves (which indeed is equally necessary to our salvation) will only lead us to despair, unless its effects be counteracted with a proportion- able knowledge of our God. The more we discern of our own depravity, the more must we see of our guilt, our danger, and our helplessness : nor can any thing pacify our consciences, and allay our fears, but a view of the divine perfections, as united and har- monizing in the work of redemption. But that once obtained, our minds will be serene and happy : and the more complete our view of God is, the more firm will be our confidence in him, and the more sublime our joy. Moses, well aware of this, prayed to God to shew him his glory. To this request God graciously condescended, and appointed him a place where he would meet him, and make this discovery unto him. In discoursing upon this mar- vellous event, we shall notice,
I. The situation in which Moses was placed —
We are told that " God stood with him there :" but this not being a prominent feature in the text, we shall premise some observations as introductory to our remarks upon it —
[In the first place, we would observe that, in interpreting the Holy Scriptures, we are not at liberty to indulge our own fancy ; we must approach them with sacred awe and reverence ; and give such explanations of them only, as we verily believe to be agreeable to the mind of that blessed Spirit, through whose inspiration they were written.
Next, we observe, that the whole of the Mosaic economy was of a typical and mysterious nature ; and that, though it is sometimes difficult to ascertain the precise import of some events, yet the meaning of those which are more striking is clear and obvious, and may be stated without any fear of deviating from the truth.
Further, there are many events, of which we should have made only a general improvement, which God himself has marked as conveying very minute and particular instruction. For instance, the miracle wrought by Moses, when he struck the rock, and thereby gave the whole nation a supply of water, which followed them all through the wilderness, might be sup- posed to teach us only, that God will supply the wants of his people who put themselves under his guidance : but St. Paid